Rutland in line for big FEMA check

BY PATRICIA ROY PROY@HOLDENLANDMARK.COM

Thursday

Feb 26, 2009 at 12:01 AM

A $965,600 check from the federal government is due to arrive next week as the first of Federal Emergency Management Agency payments for the December ice storm, Selectman Douglas Briggs announced at the board's meeting on Monday.

That bright spot in a dark winter cropped up as part of a personnel request by DPW Superintendent Gary Kellaher, who proposed using what he termed "seasonal employees" to jumpstart the town's spring cleanup effort.

The seasonal employees could be used to clear the smaller piles of brush and branches, Kellaher said.

"They can't do the heavy stuff. They can stack and chip. I'm anxious to get started on Main Street and work down to Oakham," Kellaher said.

The plan would be to clean up the center of town, and work down the road in both directions, Kellaher said. The workers hired for this purpose would focus on clearing work outside the 60-foot right of way specified by Federal Emergency Management Agency reimbursement regulations.

He recommended paying the workers who would have to be at least 18 years old in order to operate equipment, at a pay rate below the lowest rate of the DPW shop workers. The seasonal workers would be required to run chainsaws, wood chippers and shredders, Kellaher said.

Chairman Joseph Becker said he was unclear on how the seasonal workers fit into the work schedule if the town was putting together one large request for a proposal from contractors to clean up the ice storm mess.

Kellaher agreed to clarify the hiring proposal, specifying areas of town that would be cleared by the temporary workers.

The board also agreed to schedule an additional meeting with a FEMA representative to review what cleanup work should be covered in the town's request-for-proposals and whether temporary full-time employees would be eligible for reimbursement under FEMA regulations.

Selectmen also learned last night that under the federal program for Community Policing, a part of the $1 billion stimulus package, the town may be able to hire two fulltime police officers with the government picking up most of the cost for their first three years of employment.

"The program will pay the entry level salary and benefits for the first three years," Police Chief Joseph Baril said.

The town could put in for as many positions as it likes, but Baril said he would only want to pursue two full-time positions, filling them from the current ranks of part-time officers.

Any step raise that the officers got above entry pay during the three-year period would have to be made up by the town, Baril said, adding that the cost was more than offset by the benefits of the plan.

"We'd get away from our reliance on part-timers and would bolster our full-time officers," Baril said.

The application period for the federal money opens at the end of March, he said.

Selectmen also noted the state approved a staffing waiver for the town's ambulance service.

At this point in its three-year existence, the state required that the ambulance be staffed 24/7 with a paramedic and EMT always on the ride, Fire Chief Thomas Ruchala told the board earlier this month.

When funding made that stipulation impossible, Ruchala applied for the waiver, rather than risk having the town's current 18-hour-a-day ambulance service be shut down.

For the present, the ambulance will continue to be staffed 18 hours a day, with ambulance crews on call for the midnight to 6 a.m. shift.